


Clearer Vision

by MelonMass



Series: Remember to Move Foreword [3]
Category: Xī yóu jì | Journey to the West - Wú Cheng'en
Genre: And learns to read, Glasses, M/M, Multi, Six-Eared gets glasses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-04 10:52:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18342191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MelonMass/pseuds/MelonMass
Summary: He's never been good at reading. Actually, he never had that good of vision, either.





	Clearer Vision

Liuer has never had good vision. Usually, his super-hearing has been more than enough to compensate. With reading, however, it’s always been near  _ impossible. _ Characters were rarely big enough or clear enough for him to read them. Six-Eared was never good at reading anyway. Or maybe that was the reason he never got good at it. Whatever, point is he can’t read well and now it’s a problem.

It was easier towards the beginning of being there. Learning a whole new language with a whole different writing system, it was much easier to ask people to read things for him. Menus, road signs, or any of the other like. Of course, that didn’t last forever. No one just  _ reads _ to him anymore. They  **encourage** him to at least try and read for himself. They notice the way he holds the words close and squints to make some sort sense of it.

The first time anyone says anything is probably when he gets a phone. Longma sent him a test text a few seconds ago. Now Liuer's holding the device close to his face so he can find it. “Don't hold it so close to your face!” Wukong says, pulling the phone further from his face. “You'll mess up your eyes.”

“I'm trying to  _ read  _ here.” Now Six-Eared had to squint to make anything out of the screen. “It's not my fault the words are so small and blurry.”

“Then maybe we should have gotten you glasses before we got you a phone!”

“It's not that bad!” Ozzy the pup barks at him. “Don't  _ you _ start now! Pretty sure you have worse vision than me!”

The pup barks again. “That’s a  **fantastic** point, Ozzy! See? Even he knows!”

Liuer wags a finger in the dog's face. “You have no right to judge. You can't read.” Ozzy responds by doing that dog grumble whine thing and trying to jump on the couch.

“Are you two arguing with a dog?” Longma steps in and leans on the back of the couch. “He just a normal dog. He can’t really argue back.”

“He agrees that Liuer here needs glasses.” Ozzy jumps up into Wukong’s lap. The old king pets the dog absentmindedly. “You can’t be squinting at everything all the time.”

“I've seen well enough so far!” Suddenly, Longma puts their phone a foot or so in front of Liuer's face.

“What picture is this?” they ask. “And don't squint. It's a pretty clear picture.”

“I, uh.” It's hard not to squint. He blinks a few times. “Green? And…”

“Yeah, you need glasses.”

Liuer sighs dramatically. “I’m out numbered. Everyone is against me.”

“No need to be a Drama King.” Longma hugs him from behind. They whisper quietly, “I bet you’d look good in glasses, if that’s what you’re worried about. I could help you pick out a pair if you want.”

Six-Eared reluctantly agrees to at least try out some glasses. He doesn’t really expect to see much of a difference. He twirls around the new pair of spectacles in his hands. “Alright. I’m putting these on like you guys wanted.” Liuer begins to put them on as he continues speaking. “Just don’t be surprised when it doesn’t-” He stops short.  _ No way. _

“What were you saying?” Longma asks with this  _ smile. _ Oh gods, is that supposed to be this clear? He can see the differences between teeth. There’s a crisp difference between each tooth and  _ this is just too weird. _

Six-Eared pulls the glasses off and blinks. The smile isn’t so crisp and clear. He looks up, where clouds are usually just smudges of white on blue. The glasses return to his face, and clouds turn into something like crisp balls of cotton. A whine makes it way from the back of his throat. “This is just  _ weird _ .”

“It’s different, I’m sure.” Longma drapes an arm over his shoulders. “We can check out how well you read with them when we get home.”

The whole ride home, the monkey is still captivated by just how  _ clear _ the world looks. He keeps taking the glasses off and putting them back on. Trees have  _ texture, _ rather than green blobs on brown sticks. He can actually  _ see _ letters on street signs. Numbers on the house can be seen from the street.

Longma checks in on him when the car stops. “You alright there?” It makes sense they ask that. Liuer’s pretty sure he’s tearing up. “Is it too much at once? It must be the first time everything looks clear to you.”

“Have… have I been missing out?” Six-Eared reaches under his glasses to wipe away those few tears. “I mean, I can figure out where things are and what shape they are just by  _ listening _ . This whole time, normal eyes can just  _ see _ it?”

Longma leans over and kisses his forehead. “You didn’t know. It’s alright.” The dragon pulls him in close, or as close as they could with the car’s center console still between them. “And weren’t you the one that kept saying you were fine without better vision?”

Liuer nuzzles into their shoulder. “It’s  _ weird. _ ” He laughs. “You think I can actually learn to read now?”

Longma hums. They reach into their pocket for their cellphone. “We could test it right now.” They fiddle with the phone a bit to bring something up. “Just start off with something easy. What picture is this?”

Six-Eared blinks and stares. There's a lot of green in the picture. Probably because the subject is sitting under a bunch of trees. The subject being… “Wait, is that me?”

The dragon smiles. “Yeah. You looked pretty good, so I couldn't help but snap a picture.”

“Is… is this the picture you tried showing me before?”

“Yeah. It was honestly one of the first photos I could get to.”

The suddenly clear vision doesn’t stop shocking him when they actually enter the house. People’s hair has a lot more texture to it. Ozzy, that silly dog, is a different kind of fuzzy. A magazine, one just tossed aside on the couch, has  _ words _ on it. Letters he can actually make out! And he’s at least a few feet away still! Does… does that mean reading was going to get a lot easier?

Liuer tries it out with a book Longma has in their room. He found while sitting in their bed, and thought why not. The monkey’s barely paying attention to what the book is about, just the fact that  _ the words aren’t just some fuzzy blob. _ Still, he’s not very good at reading in this language. Words take him a while to get through, and even then there are many words he can’t make sense of.

A hand gently grabs onto the top of the book. A hand with slender fingers and pristine nails. The owner of said hand was none other than Longma themself. “Are you… really reading that?”

“Trying.” Liuer looks back down at a word he was struggling with. He might just skip over it like many of the other words. “Can’t read half of what’s going on.”

The dragon takes a seat on the bed next to the monkey. “I guess you don’t really know what it’s about, then.”

“I found it hidden under the pillows. I can take a guess at what it’s about.”

Longma hums and tilts his head on Liuer’s shoulder. “Would it still be wholesome to ask you to read to me?”

“As long as you don’t mind me sounding like a child first learning their words.”


End file.
